Sunday, May 23, 2010

I've finished painting one of the engine nacelles and I'm halfway through the first gun drone. If your wondering why I'm doing those before I've finished the main body, I get distracted quickly. : P I half to freshen things up to keep my attention, especially with a very demanding project like handpainting this camouflage. It also helps to give a good idea what the final project will look like, thus giving a visual destination of sorts.

Here are some pics:

I propped the engine up with bubble wrap as I will not actually glue it on until I have finished painting the side of the main body. Fortunately, it gives a good idea of where the model is headed. I have to say, after seeing most of that side of the devilfish painted, I am much happier with it. It has definitely given me more focus.

Friday, May 14, 2010

I stripped as much paint off of these Tau models that my friend gave me as I can. Thankfully, that has proven a worthwhile endeavor. I've started painting the Devilfish and have a good portion of the base coloring completed and have started painting the camouflage.

So, I promised some images of my the Fire Warrior I painted, which just so happens to be the first 40K model I have ever painetd, and the first model of any kind that I've painted in over 10 years. I also made some reference to the words "urban," "digital," and "camo."

Well, here you go:

I think it turned out pretty well. Not too bad for a guy with a decade of rust.

So, how did I go about this paint job? Glad you asked.

I sprayed a black base onto the figure using Armory Black Primer. This gave it a nice, smooth coating to paint on, while also giving a nice foundation for the acrylic-based Games Workshop (GW) paints to cling to instead of potentially peeling off of the plastic. The next step was to paint the armor sections and weapon with Astronomican Grey, a GW foundation paint.
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At this point I would like to take an aside to mention the Foundation Paints. I must say that they are definitely worth the investment. They give a good coat of paint that can give a better base for different color paints. Because I used a black spray coat to base my model with, any regular paint would need several coats to truly come out as it should. But, the Foundation Paint covers the base with a single application, thus, enabling me to use my lighter colors with single applications. This is great in that you don’t have paint build up filling crevices and small details. The fewer coats you have on a model, the more physical details show through your paint job. Now, back to your regularly scheduled programming.

Once I laid down the Foundation paints, I covered the armor in its base tone of Fortress Grey. This is the lightest of my three grey-tones I was using in my camo scheme, thus it is the base-tone. (To further explain this decision, I’ll post a camo study here in the future.) The next step was to lay my darkest tone in the camouflage scheme. I used Adeptus Battlegrey for this tone. Yes, it is actually a foundation paint, but I liked its scale and contrast with the Fortress Grey. After stippling the dark-tone areas onto the armor (Using the tip of a fine-tipped brush, one-tap-at-a-time. Not the method of using a flayed-bristle brush for multiple, chaotic, less controlled touches… that is not true stippling, that is laziness for the sake of covering more area with less effort. Taking the time to stipple one at a time may be time consuming, but it looks so much better. Trust me. You'll be much more pleased with it.), I then stippled Codex Grey on for the mid-tone.

Once the camouflage pattern was completed, I re-painted the recesses with a with a fine-tipped brush using Adeptus Battlegrey. This gave them more definition, and put a little extra “pop” into the model.

As another aside, I do not use black to paint recessed in a model. That is not the best option. It gives far too great of a contrast in your model than is necessary to convey a shadowy recess. If you want a more natural look to the shadowing, use the darkest tone of whatever color scheme you are using. Using this to fill in the recesses allows the recess to be itself. The dark tone will be further shaded by the recess, giving the appearance of an even darker tone. It is much more pleasing to the eye and can give that extra pop your model needs, while keeping it from looking like an outlined cartoon.

For the garments under the armor, I put a coat of Chaos Black. I painted the “boots” and armor straps Adeptus Battlegrey. I then used the black GW Wash to cover the “boots.”

The weapon casing was painted Fortress Grey while the butt and trigger area were painted Adeptus Battlegrey. I used a base of Gore Red and a highlight of Blood Red on the helmet reticles, and various “glowing” areas of the weapon.

For the “jewels” in various places and Tau symbol on the shoulder plate, I used Sunburst Yellow to make the model stand out and not be completely camouflaged out.

As you can see, I have tried to give the armor a camouflage pattern that appears much like a digital pattern from a distance. Close up, as in these photos, it appears more as small blotches. This is fine, as most of the time, the soldier will be seen from afar anyway.

Sunday, May 9, 2010

So, I told the peeps I was going to do urban camo for my Fire Warriors... digital looking camo even. Unlike your average Tau urban camo floating around, I will be using only grey-scale. No blues thrown in the mix.

Some were encouraging, seeing it as a cool idea. Others were quick to give a laugh, saying how nye impossible that task would become.

Whatever your position on the idea may be, I've painted one full Fire Warrior. I've finally gotten a replacement camera (Yea!!!), so I'll upload images soon and relay my comments on the process.

For now, here is a teaser image, from a crappy cell phone camera, of an UNFINISHED paint job on the Fire Warrior for my Urban Cadre.

Friday, May 7, 2010

My camera has broken, so, until I get a new one, fuzzy images from a camera phone will have to suffice. I will begin posting this weekend. Also, the Mechanical Volition will be getting a much needed upgrade in its presentation. More to come…

Tuesday, April 27, 2010

After researching the 40K universe, I have decided to go with a Tau force. I like the look and feel of their army, as well as the high tech gadgetry they have (Helloooooo!!! I’m an engineer!!!). I alos like the fact that they aren’t a horde army willing to sacrifice countless grunts just to overwhelm an enemy. They are an army that has a duty for each specific unit and desire to keep them alive… for, if one link is broken, the chain will fall apart. They are tactical and precise. An unforgiving army for beginners, yes, but one that definitely pushes one to learn the rules to better ones play skill.

Also factoring in is the fact that everyone and their brother seems to play either one of the Space Marine chapters or Orks. Tyranids were my second choice, but are a little too horde-ish for my tastes at the moment. I will probably make them my second army after I get through my Tau army, but that might be a loooooong while.

I am a new inductee into the community of Warhammer 40K. I was brought into the hobby by a dear friend of mine who shares in my Über-nerd-dom. I love science-fiction and modeling, so it definitely wasn’t a stretch to get me into the hobby.

I used to build model aircraft and sci-fi vehicles when I was in junior high and high school, but haven’t had the time since. Thus I fell away from the craft until now. I also have a heavy background in art, painting and sketching being my areas of knowledge. Throw in the fact that I am a degree holding Aerospace Engineer working on aircraft and you have quite a mix of skills that will definitely fuel my hobbying.

This will be my little project diary. Any modeling or painting I do I will outline here for future reference, for myself as well as others.